CM Hobart September 26th 2008

Two Can Play At This Game

My glass looks emptier than yours.

You Know The Scene

It's way after bed time but the bread making has dragged on and you know you are going to be up for another hour before they are ready.

BicycleTim is waiting for a Dentrecasteaux mussel, olive, anchovie, garlic, red capsicum and australian parmesan pizza to come out of the oven.

It was delicious and initiated a days kayaking this Saturday, as that was the last of the mussels

Bartlett. McKim,Hodgman - Courteous Mass 29 August 2008

Visit to Paddy and Ezzie

Braving the blustery solstice weather, I paid a visit to the ponies at Lucaston. They're revelling in the green spring growth!

Oak Tree Update

Oak Tree

Bursting with life - makes quite a contrast with the stringy barks surrounding us which look the same month in month out.

Kev's New Kayak

The champagne launch of Kevin's new kayak. Mum is away at work so Richard came with me in the double. A very cruisey trip to Franklin for coffee and back through the cut in Egg Island.

Competition Time

If anyone can guess what we did in this particular building then there will be a prize. Negative points for stating the obvious, no that is not what I am referring to.

OK I will give you clue - the middle door. Super duper prizes if you can name the small town in SA where this pic was taken.

The Port Arthur Oak Tree Confirms Spring Is Here

I meant to take a picture of the very first green bud that appeared the other day when the 'tree' looked like a bunch of dried kindling. Suddenly within a day or two this is what has appeared. There were no leaves evident yesterday.

Oh and FYI the sub woofer died while we were away; whether as Kevin said it had reached its 'die-by-date' or/and some teenagers had a wild party while we were away : ) is not known. Have to make do without house shaking bass for a while.

Bush Poetry 21st Century Style

As indicated by Thomas' rousing motivational speech he proved to be quite a word smith, composing numerous poems and ditties describing expedition events.

This little ditty is the only one that was recorded for posterity, it was a particularly cold and frosty morning so sitting around the campfire for a bit longer than usual to fine tune and record the poem was much more attractive than packing up and setting off before the sun had really started to warm the day.



Thomas inspired the rest of team to compose similar poems (except me who isn't able to string two rhyming sentences together if my life depended on it).
This one from Lynne as we traversed a particularly rough bit of track proved not only that she was up to Thomas' standard but also added a dimension to the trip that us blokes hadn't really appreciated.

I'm a huppin' cross the red dirt track
I spy me mates afar
These corrugations hold me back
- I didn't bring me bra!

More Flinders Photos

On the summit of Hayward Bluff looking south. Brachina Gorge and Wilpena Pound, fantastic views of the ranges and desert to west probably inspired the best one liner of the trip from Rob.

"It's just like Google Earth!"




Just couldn't resist playing with various pieces of junk found en route.

Stu's only puncture, one of those pesky thorns. Very few punctures overall apart from Lynne who proved she was the Puncture Fairy, even getting two one morning before we had even left camp.

Open country and roads with a good enough surface to attain astonishing speeds of 20kph or even more.

After 10/11 days of cycling from Wilpena we reached the mining town of Leigh Creek and the luxuries of a shower and beer (or two).

Geoff and his wife Diane at Depot Springs. They put us up for the night, provided beer then coffee and cake the next morning plus a great insight into station life.

The area abounds with the remains of the various mining exploits in the 1800's and early 1900's. All it needs is a bit of grease and we would have had it going in no time.

Dreaming country - touch the earth.


After a hard game of horse shoe pitching at the Lively Mine hut, which Lynne won convincingly, it was felt that to overcome the rigours of another hour or so of cycling late in the afternoon we needed a motivational speech. Thomas took on this important role with a panache that kept the strength and cohesion of the group together for enough time for us to find another great campsite.
This coincidentally is that very day's camp, fire lit, billy on and tents pitched. It became a very nice regular routine.

We spent quite a lot of time sitting around the fire. There was much baking of vegetables, scones and damper too.

Thomas baking scones.

Voila! One of Thomas' scones.

Stu and Lynne at Moolooloo Station.


Words just can't describe this unique River Red Gum we discovered off track in the Warraweena valley. Surely an inspiration for Tolkien's Ents.

Very glad to be back on a road after a few hours of pushing and struggling off track following a fence line. The road shown on the map that we should have been on didn't exist on the ground.

Andy Goldsworthy eat your heart out. The creek beds were full of these 'installations', neat stacks of leaves and twigs created as flood waters receded.

Flinders Photos

First nights' camp a few kms north of Wilpena

The team about to leave Wilpena, even though it is sunny you can see by the amount of clothes we have on how cold it was.

Me - towing the larder with 10 days food

Dust storm and mega headwinds coming into Blinman. At least there was pub there with beer to wash out the dust.

We camped just about every night in creek beds with some fantastic river red gums.

Wilpena

Well as you know we nearly missed the ferry. Thank you Louisa for the 'if you are not living close to the edge, you're taking up too much space' sentiment - quite right! Just like penguins on an ice flow.

You know the routine, drive until it's bedtime then pull off and pitch the tent, this is a bit earlier in the evening coming into Mildura for pizza for dinner.



We didn't get here until midday Monday, a bit later than the planned Sunday afternoon, then the weather held us up. The day we arrived was wet with very low cloud just like Tas. It's been bloody cold too, I have not worn so many clothes, woolly hats and gloves for a long time. I think we and the weather are ready for the off tomorrow morning the mountain of food has been sorted 10 days with us, another five days in the car for later and we will pick up another 10/12 days in Leigh Creek.



We all went for a walk up St Marys Peak yesterday, quite a long way up and a circuit of over 20km, a few of us are nursing aches and pains today.

Here is Mum on the summit.

Look What You Have Done Girls!

It all started with you posting pictures of your travels on Farcebook, so Mum joined just so she could see the photos. Now the poor soul is addicted to Farcebook , endless games of Scrabble with her internet 'friends', I can never get her away from the computer!

Very Frosty Morning

Yes, paddocks are as white with frost as they look.
The sun just starting to catch the mountain summits

More Winter

I know we seem to have posted on a wintery theme recently but there has been some great weather, not too cold and wet, just enough to put a useful amount of water in the tanks and produce some great dustings of snow on Collins Bonnet.

Too a certain extent it is novelty value as we had such a long spell of settled weather through the spring and early winter.

Mum and I had planned a lighting 3 day trip up Frenchmans last w/e but the weather wasn't suitable.

JJJ

I bought a new tuner/amp before the last weeks film night as the erratic fault on one channel of the old one was getting worse.

And, dumdum da dum, once I had fiddled with the aerial we can now blast JJJ through the house as never before. You probably realised the sound track to Winter Again was JJJ. Its great to listen to new music if only so I don't say "who, are they?" when the Falls line up is announced.

Getting in to the free mp3 downloads such as this one which is being played a lot on air http://mpegmedia.abc.net.au/triplej/newmusic/
dopusandroshambo/milliondollarbill.mp3
though why she wants bean bag beats me.

Winter Again !

Really Interesting!

Well, I was off to Melbourne for the day last Friday as part of a tour of the cities notable bicycle infrastructure. Most interesting for some I am sure. If you want more pictures of bike lanes let me know.


Here is our bus blocking a bike lane, cyclists really hate this.


Here are a couple of people blocking another bike lane, cyclists don't mind this so much as at least pedestrians are soft.

Winter at Last!

Today brought that wonderful wintery weather with showers blustering through from the south-west, blotting out the mountain, then spotlighting it with pale watery sunbursts, showing off the new powder coatings of snow. Rain hammered on the roof for it seems like the first time in four or five months!
Kauri finally consented to having her rug on, and joyfully trotted back to her goaty home after a couple of weeks on Kevin's bowling green (or brown).

Horses @ Owen and Sue's

Sorry I am a bit late putting these up and they are not crash hot really. Mum and I were around there for dinner and pick up hay for Karui Saturday before last. I tried uploading some video but it didn't work so you will have to make do with these pics of your darlings for now.